


On the House

by JaneXemylixa



Category: Hotline Miami (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Site: FicBook.Net
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-11
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-18 13:08:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29983338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaneXemylixa/pseuds/JaneXemylixa
Summary: I know, you’re hungry. You look terrible, although who am I to talk — I’m dead.[translation from Russian]
Relationships: Beard & Jacket (Hotline Miami)
Kudos: 5





	On the House

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [За мой счёт](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/775029) by Лимми.а. 



I know, you’re hungry. You look terrible, although who am I to talk — I’m dead.

I’m not gonna ask how your day went, what you’ve been doing today, who called you, why you’ve got a knife in your pocket and why you look so lost — because you don’t need questions. You need answers, and I don’t have any. Although if you knew something, so would I — I'm just a figment of your imagination, after all.

But a figment so sweet and precious you accept it gratefully, hoping that maybe the world isn’t so terrifying and there’s still some good and warmth left in it.

You’re lost and angry and scared — like back in the war that you and I went through together. I carried you out of the blast in my arms…

Take this, it’s just pizza: cheese, bacon, tomato splats, olive flecks — classic, delicious. Take it, it’s on the house.

And later, back at your place, when you’ve wearily thrown off your clothes and sit at the table in just your pants, staring a thousand yards ahead and slowly chewing the still warm dough and the toppings — try to remember why you know this taste, and why you know me.

I know, your mind blocks out the memories — they’re hurting you, and even though you took pills and went to group sessions, you tried to fight that, and I… I’m dead. But know this: I would’ve gone with you the whole way.

But you’re silently thanking me, and I’m happy, I’m glad.

Take it easy dude, it’s all on the house.

* * *

I know, you need to unwind. You look terrible, although who am I to talk — I’m dead.

I couldn’t care less what the papers say. I don’t care where you come from, where you go to, why they’re after you — for me you’re the same old Jacket who stood to attention with me and the rest of the doomed squad, whom I dragged out of the fire, who posed for a picture with me.

There’s a good movie, take it. There’s no war in it. Or masked people who sometimes appear in your mind next to me. You’re trying to wrestle your happy memories back from them, and they say – you’re a bad person, you like to hurt others.

And I say — no worries, it’s all on the house. That I’m always happy to see you, always there for you.

And just for a second, halfway into the cheesy movie, you’ll try to remember where you saw me before. Perhaps your tired brain, perceiving the masked strangers as reality, feels that things I said forever ago are too bright and hopeful to be true.

_“When we come back I’ll open a video store or a bar…”_

But it’s nothing next to how your mind is denying my death, that a nuclear strike wiped me and my dreams off the face of the Earth, with everything all I fought for and lived for.

  
“Hey man, don’t you worry. It’s all on the house.”


End file.
